In shocking news to anyone that hasn’t read a YouTube comment before, a new study on grammar out of Northumbria University reveals that most people have absolutely zero idea on how to formulate a sentence. On the results of the study Dr. Dabrowska writes: “These findings are ground breaking, because for decades the theoretical and educational consensus has been solid. Regardless of educational attainment or dialect we are all supposed to be equally good at grammar, in the sense of being able to use grammatical cues to understand the meaning of sentences.” Don’t be too alarmed: the study took place in England.

And by that I mean they’re starting a quantum mechanics-based method of increasing efficiency among troops. Or in layman’s terms: creating hulking, bloodthirsty, atomic supermen capable of eating bullets and using psychic lightning bolts to blow up terrorists (I mean, what else right?). Yes: BaTMAN: Biochronicity and Temporal Mechanisms Arising in Nature. RoBIN: Robustness of Biologically-Inspired Networks. Probably just a coincidence, then isn’t it? io9 is geeking out on it and Wired’s The Danger Roomis into the science. Our biggest concern: I want it known that if you Google-image for “Batman and Robin,” the first thing that comes up is a picture of them kissing.

“In the 77 days since oil from the ruptured Deepwater Horizon began to gush into the Gulf of Mexico, BP has skimmed or burned about 60 percent of the amount it promised regulators it could remove in a single day. “
-EMPHASIS MINE. Go ahead. Freak out on them.

Did you and/or your friends hear that July 5, 2010 — also known as “yesterday” — was one of the target dates for Back To The Future’s time-traveling DeLorean? Well, don’t worry if you didn’t, because it’s not true — not even for those late-aughts-produced DirecTV ads that starred Christopher Lloyd. This little bit of misinformation (complete with misleading Photoshop!) was apparently hatched by TotalFilm and turned into an Internet Holiday Wildfire (that’s still burning, thanks to a follow-up Photoshop that changed the DeLorean’s date to July 6!) thanks to the killer combination of that site’s Twitter account having almost 30,000 followers and people not really double-checking anything on the Internet, ever. (“It seems some lax research and average photoshop skills go a long way on Twitter these days,” mused TotalFilm, which apparently just arrived on the Internet.) I would also hazard a guess that peoples’ inherent desire to moan and groan about feeling old played into this particular rumor spreading as quickly as it did, so get ready for more of that when the actual date arrives!

by Nate Freeman

When Hunter S. Thompson used to make the quick trip from his home in Woody Creek to downtown Aspen, he would stop at the J-Bar, the ancient watering hole that has soused up the tenants of its adjoining Hotel Jerome since 1883. “Right over there,” the bartender at the 19th-century artifact said, as I ordered a Stella. “Hunter would always sit in that corner.” The bar even has one of the iconic “HUNTER THOMPSON FOR SHERIFF” posters hanging there. And, yeah, it’s a genuinely classy place. It has a classic rust-bruised tin ceiling that would be “trying too hard” if it weren’t, well, real. Yes, Hunter might like this place. But hold on a second, you think to yourself. You’re in Aspen, and the people here blow.

There’s no doubt that Aspen is beautiful and lovely and historic, but it’s hard to think of the town without envisioning the nation’s wealthiest people frolicking around with their piles of paper; in the county, the median home price is now edging back up from the slump to $4.1 million. At midnight, when Time crossed the precipice into Our Lord’s Day of Freedom, I saw this town of Aspen epitomized by two divergent pieces of its lore: the work Thompson did near Aspen cementing his place permanently in the hands of rebellious tenth-grade readers the world over; and, on the other end of the spectrum, the unapologetic excess of the boys and girls who summer there on Daddy’s Dime. It’s impossible to think that the suffocating amount of Money Old and New wouldn’t rub Hunter the wrong way. I mean, wasn’t this no different from the sleazeball America that he encountered in Vegas? The America that the Godfather of Gonzo witnessed through a lens of hallucinogens and then promptly derided in the pages of the then-great Rolling Stone?

With this pre-judgment of the town firmly in place, I went to investigate the authenticity of Aspen’s Rocky Mountain-styled paean to the Amber Waves of Grain. I went looking for some “real” inhabitants of the town. Its current residents are mostly those escaping the smog and humidity of Texas and Miami summers.

A delusional sense of “belonging” can occur for these part-timers. Perhaps the heartfelt memories of consecutive summers spent sneaking cocktails at The Ritz and begging Mommy for another Burberry bag could amount to some sort of emotional citizenship. And on most days of the year, after a drink or twelve, I would acquiesce to these trust fund darlings the tenuous status of being a “local” of Aspen, Colorado-but not on Independence Day.

I wandered from the J-Bar-blown out by its song after song of seventies shit-rock-into the fabled Aspen village promenade. Look, it’s a store selling expensive shit! And, look, it’s people wearing that expensive shit! Entranced by the selling and wearing of expensive shit, I found myself in line for a bar where both these actions were best represented. After quick conversation with a girl whose dress was slipping down with precipitous speed-”It’s the place to be,” she said between drags on a cigarette-I descended the stairwell. There, nary an hour into the anniversary of this country’s independence, I witnessed The Youngs eating up the freedom all those wars purchased for them. Girls giggled almost loud enough to drown out the music, and they wheeled strap-heavy bags strung on their shoulders into the bathroom. (Though, full disclosure, many of these girls were off-the-charts gorgeous-hooray for good breeding!) Unfortunately, a cavalcade of bros rose up and corralled them to a booth where their bottle of Goose pricked up in the center of a silver ice-filled cylinder. All around, awful thirty- and forty-somethings squeezed their longnecks of Whatever Light so hard you’d think they were actually clutching the last vestiges of their long-lost youth.

I awoke the next day awash in the sunbeams of Democracy, but after the events of the previous night, and my general preconception of Aspen, I wasn’t exactly excited for the day’s parade. I expected to be surrounded by hordes of moneyed men in fresh-bought Stetsons donned only for the occasion, their wives with fried blonde hair cracking from botched procedures, their daughters standing by, eyes shielded from the sun’s rays by sunglasses that cost more than some cars. In person, their legs had no such shielding, however, and the sons of industry scions took quick notice of what ran down below those high-end Daisy Dukes. The Maid of Honor-America-seemed to be relegated to the second act.

But then something odd happened. As the parade started to roll down Main Street, directly in front of the Hotel Jerome, the cheering intensified. Girls on floats threw candy to the crowd. Items of clothing, regardless of the brand name, could be found hosting a likeness of our American logos stuffed into any possible location-I saw a flag and/or bald eagle on ball caps, stuffed into shirt collars and tank tops, everywhere. Then trucks rumbled down the street, and inside of them were veterans from Iraq, Vietnam, even Normandy Beach. And they, too, got immense cheers. They were even smiling, They were smiling and waving to the crowd.

It became nothing more or less than a Fourth of July Parade in an smallish town anywhere in America. And you could forget about the context of it all-no history of exorbitant wealth, no kids ordering bottle service with Daddy’s credit card, no bickering between the residents and the vacationers.

And I was one with them. I ran some system checks: I had no fear, I had no loathing. Maybe Hunter had picked the right bar after all.

Nate Freeman is a proprietor of The ## and a former columnist for the Duke Chronicle-and, when he’s done traveling, will be one of The Awl’s summer reporters.

“[Minnesota] Republican gubernatorial candidate Rep. Tom Emmer said the state could gain jobs if employers could a pay a lower hourly wage to employees who earn a lot of money from tips.”
–Sure. It’s a plan?

Will “Editing” Become The New Hot Trend In Internet Publishing?

Fark creator Drew Curtis on the innovation in internet media that will, he believes, move us all beyond the flogged-to-death concept of “crowdsourcing”: “The real power in social media happens when that one person in a million comes up with an awesome idea, and those who can do so kick it to the front of the line. Speeding up this process is the next great advance in social media. Some will probably call this Web 3.0. I call it editing.” But what if those editors just have the “awesome idea” of following the masses anyway and dressing up their lemminglike ways with innovation-hinting buzzwords?

One person who went through some recent jobs data says that: “the average length of unemployment is always higher for the older cohort (45+) regardless of the level of education; generally the more education an individual has, the higher the average length of unemployment.” But, but, but what about all those factories who were telling the Times they just can’t find anyone to hire?

According to the AP, a 91-year-old woman was found living with the corpses of her husband and twin sister. As widow Jean Stevens puts it, “death is very hard to take.” So is taking out the trash apparently! No, but really, I mean, I’ve heard of some boring house guests! No but seriously, the grieving process is a tough thing for everyone. [via Buzzfeed, via AP video, via your nightmares.]

As if waiting for big-screen versions of the canceled-before-their-time TV programs Veronica Mars and Arrested Development wasn’t enough, now we have to get all garment-rendy about the possibility of a Party Down movie, too? I mean, I loved the show and think it got a raw deal, but I’m starting to wonder if “hoping for a movie and talking about said hope on the Internet” is becoming synonymous with “denial” in the Six Stages Of Canceled-Television Grief. [Pic via

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